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SNL Recap: Zach Galifianakis / Vampire Weekend
STEVE MURPHY: I think most actual Obama speeches are funnier than this sketch. Maybe they should stop calling this a “Cold Open” and start calling it the “Dead Open?”
ZOË RICE: Eh, the opening was just not that funny. They could have done something much more clever about healthcare.
HOWARD MEGDAL: This drags, and is utterly aimless. How hard would it have been to make fun of Democrats, Republicans or even the general public here? The target was nobody.
SNL: Ashton Kutcher/Them Crooked Vultures
HOWARD MEGDAL: This one leaves me unimpressed. Pretty scattershot, and Gibbs wouldn’t appear on that panel, plus that isn’t remotely like Robert Gibbs. This one is overdone. Look, they show that Fox News is unbalanced. I already knew that. Even the Glenn Beck, by virtue of being material-free, wastes a good effort from Jason Sudeikis.
STEVE MURPHY: Not their worst… but not funny, either. Although I did enjoy looking at Abby Elliot.
ZOË RICE: The best thing about this open was Attractive Blonde Lady, which made me chuckle. Unfortunately the overall affect was slow, with a couple decent moments but not enough.
SNL: Charles Barkley/Alicia Keys
ZOË RICE: I expected little from Charles Barkley’s monologue, and so it surpassed my slim expectations. I give him a B; it picked up with “Pretty, in a kinda Jewish way” but of course then took a dip again with Kenan Thompson (although I like “Well, some of it’s great. And some of it we’re gonna do anyway.”) And it’s true, SNL, where are the black hosts? And also more talented black sketch comics?
STEVE MURPHY: I also loved the “pretty, in a kinda Jewish way” joke, but the rest of this suffered from Barkley’s signature speech impediment. It’s like he’s trying to talk with a mouthful of marbles. But agreed, they need some more diversity in this cast. Let’s get rid of Kenan and replace him with someone funny. Wait, did that make sense? Regardless, let’s replace Kenan.
HOWARD MEGDAL: It was really amusing at the end when Kenan Thompson did that voice that sounds like Kenan Thompson.
Taylor Swift: Entertainer of the Year? Really?
CHRIS PUMMER: Bland with a backstory is the only thing that the old forms of big media are hocking these days. Probably because with so many folks tuning out, it’s the only thing left with a bankable profit margin. And that’s why Entertainer of the Year probably doesn’t mean what it did five years ago. For sure not what it did 10 or 20 years ago, when breaking through on TV and the pop charts meant you really reached everybody.
STEPHON JOHNSON: Taylor Swift winning AP Entertainer of the Year? There’s an app for that. It’s called Kanye West
SNL: Blake Lively / Rihanna
STEVE MURPHY: Muppets? Where the hell did this joke even come from? Are the Muppets somehow a timely reference? I can’t tell if Blake Lively is terrible or if this idea is just the worst thing ever. The Muppets were funny a couple weeks ago in that driving sketch, but this was a horrific second appearance for what could have been a great recurring set of characters. Shouldn’t the monologue have something at least tangentially related to the host? I will say that Blake Lively’s breasts performed very well.
HOWARD MEGDAL: She made Megan Fox look like a pilgrim! But right on- monologue was totally aimless.
SNL: Joseph Gordon-Levitt / Dave Matthews Band
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C O L D O P E N :
ZOË RICE: Lesson learned here: sarcasm through a translator will pretty much always be funny. And I continue to look forward to Fred Armisen’s…
SNL: January Jones/Black Eyed Peas
STEVE MURPHY: A lukewarm way to start the show. Joe Biden doesn’t have the level of public exposure these days that I think was needed to pull this one off. Plus… I mean the jokes really weren’t the kind a person laughs at.
HOWARD MEGDAL: I am all for topical humor, but is the idea that Joe Biden says what’s on his mind particularly topical?
SNL: Gerard Butler/Shakira
ZOË RICE: Great start! Don’t get Barack Obama angry…or you’re dealing with The Rock Obama. Kudos to the Rock for his half Hulk half Obama impression. My favorite part is “You like your insurance? Better call your insurance.”
STEVE MURPHY: Dwayne Johnson is usually hilarious, and I love this concept… But the pacing of this sketch was murder. It got so boring I wanted to skip it. And then it somehow got even more boring, and I could almost feel the audience sympathy laughing. Not an auspicious start. Also, I get that he changes from Obama into The Rock… but why is he talking like The Incredible Hulk and not like The Rock?
HOWARD MEGDAL: Agreed, Steve. What a waste of The Rock. He was perhaps the best host from last season. This was much better done the first time around.
SNL: Drew Barrymore/Regina Specktor
ZOË RICE: This riff on Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize win gave me a chuckle. In his press conference, Fred Armisen’s Barack wishes he could have gotten the call from Sweden directly, because: Hillary, “Remember that 3 AM call you were so worried about? It happened. Nobel Peace Prize.” Smartly, the writers kept this bit brief enough that it didn’t wear out its humor.
STEVE MURPHY: I am loving this new Obama impression. Much funnier than the old one, if less accurate. This was a nice start, a handful of solid jokes, and not too long. “I won it because I’m not George Bush,” was a great way to say what I think many of us have been thinking. Another pretty good political cold open!
HOWARD MEGDAL: Also loved the 3 AM call line. Kudos to Kristen Wiig while holding the check.
SNL In Review: Ryan Reynolds/Lady Gaga
ZOË RICE: My, this was depressing. A whole checklist of non-change from Fred Armisen’s Barack Obama. Do we have health care? “Hell no!” It’s a shame, too, because when Obama accomplishes something, we laugh. He got a white police officer and a black professor together for a beer–that’s hilarious! I imagine the public option woulda had me rolling on the floor.
HOWARD MEGDAL: So I am always happy when they open with political humor- but I don’t really see how this resonates. It’s this fundamental misread of what a president does. Pretty clearly, the humor of this week rested in the Senate Finance Committee, which The Daily Show exploited fully. SNL can do better here.
STEVE MURPHY: Well, this was pretty brutal, but funny! It’s been a while since a political sketch made me chuckle (note: not laugh) on SNL, especially in the Cold Open. Armisen has seriously revised his Obama impression, limiting it to pretty much just a wig and a suit, dropping Obama’s signature cadence to use Armisen’s standard speaking voice. I think this new impression works very well, Obama’s slow speech pattern always stepped on his jokes.